If you ever wanted to understand the expression “shift the power” and ‘red nose day” the place to be was the Shift the Power (#StP) learning and convening event in Accra, from 9th-12th October, where a search for the definition of #StP and ‘Red Nose Day’ unpacked the phrases.
A rare fundraising strategy to find, ‘Red Nose Day’ is an annual fundraising campaign created by philanthropic organisation, Comic Relief to end child poverty throughout the world. Red Nose Day is all about making a difference in the lives of other people. The money raised goes towards helping so many life-changing projects in the United Kingdom and across the world.
Participants during the convening
The four-day conversation on “Shifting Power in Development Practice” saw anchor partners implementing the #StP in Ghana (STAR-Ghana Foundation & the West Africa Civil Society Institute, WACSI), Malawai (Tilitonse Foundation) and Zambia (Zambia Governance Foundation), Comic Relief, and a bilateral organisation - the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO, UK), come together for a productive meeting at the Alisa Hotel in Accra.
They reviewed the programme, shared knowledge, and strategised on better ways of working.
In Ghana, the #StP is being championed through a programme dubbed “Civil Society Strengthening Programme” (CSSP-#StP) as an enabling long term investment support for civil society in their diversity–organised and informal groups, think tanks, community-based organisations, among others.
The CSSP-#StP is an eight-year programme being implemented by STAR-Ghana Foundation and WACSI, with funding from Comic Relief and the FCDO, aims to provide long term support to Civil Society Actors (CSAs) in Ghana, contributing to their resilience, responsiveness, and effectiveness in delivering the priorities of their constituents.
The programme aims to provide long term support to CSAs in Ghana, contributing to their resilience, responsiveness, and effectiveness in delivering the priorities of their constituents.
It seeks to build institutional resilience of civil society organisations (CSOs) in Ghana by providing a more progressive, negotiated, participatory and widely owned solution to social development work.
Team Ghana -STAR-Ghana Foundation & WACSI
As Eunice Racheal Agbeyandzi, Head of Programmes at the STAR-Ghana Foundation puts it, the #StP is different from other programmes because it is a long-term investment, a programme that reaches out to smaller orgnaisations that usually may not receive support by other programmes though they may be doing good work, and thirdly, the programme invests in capacity development, which is important.
She explained the #StP starts from different levels, from the anchor partners as institutions that support civil society - if you are into grant making how do you change your systems to be able to work with civil society, and if you are capacity builder how do you do the same.
“I believe the #StP has relevance for organisations first but then it also has relevance for the entire quality humanitarian development process where the decision making has been around who is funding and has the power to determine what to fund.”
“How do we balance the imbalance to ensure that decisions around money use, where it goes are both created by those who have the funding and the capacity, the expertise, legitimacy, among others to implement,” she said.
Read more: https://www.gbcghanaonline.com/news/civil-society-strengthening-programme-launched/2023/
On her part, Nana Asantewaa Afadzinu, Executive Director of WACSI, said the #StP is about how to combine powers and efforts to really change and transform a system that has been historically discriminatory, when it has to deal with organisations working in the global south in the way they engage.
She noted that very often there is talk about the power that communities have, the agency that dwells therein –what they do themselves with traditional leaders, local government, among others.
“We are not really talking about that power that communities have. And so, when we are talking about shifting power, I think that we must really centre this power of communities and it is one of the most powerful things about this programme.”
“We recognise that we often look at the power that international organisations have - power that mainly is utilised and even acknowledged by the organisations in the global North,” she said.
Consequently, she said the #StP is not only about ensuring that we have international power - global north, global south, but we are also looking at how are we centring the power that our communities have.
“It is a prototype for us and how we relate with each other as bilateral, local, philanthropic, and international organisations, our processes, how we work with each other and our partners. We are also being tested,” she added.
Read more: https://thebftonline.com/2023/04/27/csos-build-capacity-to-close-accountability-gap/
Site visits
In two groups of about 15 each, the Gomoa Mpromanmu at Ekumfi (Central Region) group led by ‘self-proclaimed’ tourist guides namely, Sarah Adjei, Programmes Manager at STAR-Ghana, and Nancy Kankam Kusi, Project Officer at WACSI, visited Youth Rise International (YoRI), a non-partisan youth-led grassroots and advocacy organisation that is a catalyst fund partner on the CSSP#StP programme.
It emerged that the major intervention – a community-led surveillance group (midwife, youth representative, opinion leader, women leader, etc) to monitor, educate and support pregnant women - by YoRI powered by the support from the #StP has led to a reduction in maternal mortality in the area.
The Executive Director of YoRI, David K. Awusi, said their association with STAR-Ghana under the CSSP-#StP catalyst fund has enabled them to put is systems and strengthen their organisation to garner the needed funds to support 120 pregnant women in 13 communities with healthcare which ensured their safe delivery.
“We looked at helping to reduce and possibly eliminate barriers to the safety of pregnant women before, during and after labour. We realized there was high risk of mortality as most did not attend antenatal care due to lack of knowledge, lack of access to health posts, and poverty,” he said.
The other group visited the Care for Society Network International at Kyebi in the Eastern Region, whom through its ‘YEN ANIDASO CLUBS OF READERS’, project has led to the heartwarming tale of over 1,000 pupils in rural communities in Ghana improving their reading proficiency.
Now they are confident and can express themselves well. The Founder of the organisation, Anita Amoako-Gyimah said the journey has not been easy in getting learning and reading materials.
However, through their association with STAR-Ghana Foundation catalyst fund support, and WACSI’s capacity building, under the CSSP-#StP have enabled them to access grants to run their projects.
Team Malawi (Tilitonse Foundation)
Notable
Participants with much enthusiasm as they were from the beginning of the convening engaged in group discussions which afforded them the chance to learn from each other, shared their opinions/perspectives on topics on Advocacy and Communications, and Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning, as well as developed their teamwork.
There were also sub-group working sessions; learning sub-group; Communications and Advocacy sub-group; and CEO sub-group.
It is said that play is the antidote to a life consumed by work. Participants really enjoyed some icebreakers which provided fun, creative, and lighthearted activities which enabled them to get know each other and be comfortable with one another.
Tourism
Ghana has natural, historical, and cultural attractions A sight-seeing took them from the Ridge residential area through to the Ridge Hospital roundabout, the National Theatre Road to Jamestown, Korle lagoon, lavender hill, the central business district of the Greater Accra region, and to the newly refurbished Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park.
At the park, dedicated to the memory of Ghana’s first President, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, and serving as the final resting place of his mortal remains, and that of his wife, Fathia Nkrumah, a tour guide gave a brief history about Dr. Nkrumah.
Afterwards, the team went round the park that boasts of an expanded recreational area, a fountain, the old bronze statue of Dr. Nkrumah, which was vandalized after the 1966 coup, a state vehicle used by the former President, and a museum that exhibits the personal belongings of Dr. Nkrumah, including books, dresses, beds, and suitcases.
While some members of the group went shopping at the Makola market, others took to the Centre for National Culture, locally referred to as the ‘Arts Centre” situated next to the park to buy locally made souvenirs ranging from kente cloth, fine wood carvings, photo paintings, beads, and many more.
The team from Zambia (Zambia Governance Foundation)
Other programmes
The four-day convening ended with a dinner at the Gold Coast Restaurant located at Cantonments. It was indeed a successful evening as participants laughed all evening, danced, and ate yummy Ghanaian dishes.
Outlook
Training courses are organised to have a positive outcome: to change or improve ways of working and ultimately take action. Participants shared their learning and experiences, committed to talk and walk the #StP movement.
It is expected that each organisation will take/imbibe the learning that comes out of the conversation and shift power within our own organisations.
By Ama Achiaa Amankwah Baafi